Athough a ‘perfect storm’ erupted against phrenology, many others including Darwin’s friend William A F Browne were enthusiastic advocates of the new craze of phrenology, and surgeon John Lizars, who also taught Erasmus Alvey Darwin, abandoned the practice of slicing of the brain like a loaf of bread to investigate certain discrete areas within the brain as a result. Many of Darwin’s teachers conceded that phrenology had a serious neuroanatomical contribution to make.

In Darwin’s Secret Cause, the authors describe how Charles Darwin developed a horror of bleeding from attending over 100 hours of anatomy classes and dissecting rooms, writing of Alexander Munro III“I dislike him & his lectures so much that I cannot speak with decency about them. He is so dirty in person & actions”.

“The author of The Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation would, I presume, say that, after a certain unknown number of generations, some bird had given birth to a woodpecker, and some plant to the mistletoe, and that these had been produced perfect as we now see them; but this assumption seems to me to be no explanation, for it leaves the case of the coadaptations of organic beings to each other and to their physical conditions of life, untouched and unexplained.

Alfred Russel Wallace eventually said that something in “the unseen universe of Spirit” had interceded at least three times in history. The first was the creation of life from inorganic matter. The second was the introduction of consciousness in the higher animals. And the third was the generation of the higher mental faculties in mankind.

Indeed, Rudolf Steiner developed a new path to spiritual knowledge which he called ‘Spiritual Science‘, maintaining that in our modern World, we should gain a direct knowledge of the supersensible by developing our latent spirituality in full rational consciousness.

This debate split Charles Darwin from his friends, but Origin of Speciesdoes not attempt to tackle the numinous. It does not even attempt to address the issue. Charles Darwin lived at a time when ideas were rapidly evolving and he was surrounded by radical ideas. Charles Darwin knew the established Church would react violently to Origin of Species, but the World needed radical ideas to break free from the dogma of the past.

It has answered to a considerable extent: my sickness much checked and considerable strength gained (6.5.1849)” and “Dr.James Manby Gully & the Cold Water Cure, which has had an astonishingly renovating action on my health (13.6.1849)” and “Dr.James Manby Gully tells me I shall have to follow treatment for a year. I consider the sickness as absolutely cured.

And about 3 weeks since I had 12 hours without any flatulence, which showed me that it was possible that even that can be cured, as Dr. G. has always said he could (7.7.1849)” and “I steadily gain in weight & eat immensely & am never oppressed with my food.

I have lost the involuntary twitching of the muscles & all the fainting feelings &c black spots before eyes &c &c DrJames Manby Gully thinks he shall quite cure me in 6 or 9 months more (12.10.1849)” and “Having gained weight ever since I commenced is a clear sign that I have not overdosed myself.”

Darwin does criticise homeopathy and Dr. James Manby Gully, despite of the improvement in his health:

“I cannot but think in my beloved DrJames Manby Gully, that he believes in everything” when his daughter was very ill, he had a clair-voyant girl to report on internal changes, a mesmerist to put her to sleep” an homeopathist, viz Dr.John Chapman; & himself as Hydropathist! & the girl recovered (4.9.50)“

“Dr James Manby Gully did me much good (7.12.1855)” and “It was very kind in Dr.James Manby Gully to speak so of me: if you go there again, pray remember me most kindly to him, & say that never (or almost never) the vomiting returns, but that I am a good way from being a strong man (3.10.1856)“

We like Dr Ayerst tho’ he has not the influence of Dr James Manby Gully. Dr James Manby Gully it is hopeless to try to see tho’ I must say he has been to see Ch. twice & he quite approves of his treatment. He takes 2 or 3 wet rubbings in the day & small walks in the garden, but he is weak— Our stay here has however been of real use to our sick boy & put us on a better system with him. Ch. appetite is so good I think he must get strength soon & he has struggled on for 5 days without sickness.

Even so, Darwin remained fascinated by the ideas and philosophy he learnt from James Manby Gully and from his other homeopathic physicians and friends. He continued to investigate homeopathy for many years after Annie’s death, receiving treatment from homeopaths and corresponding with them:

“The German homeopathic doctor has not been identified. He was seemingly an adherent of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe‘s law of spiral growth of plants. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe claimed in his paper, [there is in plants a general spiral tendency, through which, in connection with a vertical tendency, every construction, every form of plant following the law of metamorphoses is achieved] (Goethes Werke pt 2, 7: 49).

Dana Ullman believes he has been able to identify the German homeopath:

Now I am quite unhappy at the thought of having to publish such a statement.

The reader will best realise this degree of dilution by remembering that 5,000 ounces would more than fill a thirty one gallon cask or barrel and that to this large body of water one grain of the salt was added – only half a drachm or thirty minims of the solution poured over the leaf. Yet this amount sufficed to cause the inflection of the leaf.

In fact, every time that we perceive an odour, we have evidence that infinitely smaller particles act on our nerves. Moreover, this extreme sensitiveness, exceeding that of the most delicate part of the human body, as well as the power of committing various impulses from one part of the leaf to another, have been acquired without the intervention of any nervous system.”

It is not surprising that homeopaths were amongst the first people to embrace Darwin’s Origins of Species and to write to him to share their ideas and offer him support.